A Bitter Truth: A Bess Crawford Mystery

While attempting to help a woman in distress, World War I battlefield nurse Bess Crawford learns a bitter truth—that no good deed goes unpunished—in this third mystery in a series that moves between the trenches in France and the country houses of England. Coming home to her London lodgings for a bit of Christmas leave, late in 1917, Bess finds a well-bred young woman standing bruised and shivering in her doorway. Lydia, as she calls herself, has run away from a domestic quarrel, yet asks Bess to take her back home to Vixen Hill in Sussex, where Bess finds a house in mourning for a lost son—and finds herself accused when another houseguest meets an untimely death.

"At the outset of [Charles] Todd's outstanding third Bess Crawford mystery (after 2010's An Impartial Witness) ... the tenderhearted Bess agrees to accompany Lydia back home so she can provide moral support. On arrival in Sussex, Bess finds herself in the midst of a family ... hiding poisonous secrets.... The Todds (a mother-son writing team) plausibly insert their heroine yet again into a criminal investigation, besides providing their usual depth of characterization."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The Todds excel at complex characterizations.... For lovers of upper-drawer British whodunits and Anglophiles in general, A Bitter Truth should prove a sweet treat indeed."—Wilmington Star-News